Palestine

In Palestine, we focus our efforts on improving women and girls’ access to justice and improving support services and referral systems for victims of violence. This focus has been informed by research and consultations CTDC has carried out with practitioners, academics, women, judges, forensic practitioners, lawyers, activists, women’s organisations, and international organisations including UN Women, UNDP, and the World Bank, to assess the situation of women in Palestine. The assessment highlighted the complexity of the situation, which is influenced by factors that include the Israeli occupation, political restrictions on movement, the lack of Palestinian national unity and culture. Those factors contributed to the marginalisation of issues related to women and gender, as they have become to be perceived as secondary to occupation. Nonetheless, there are many grassroots and national women’s organisations that have been working on promoting women’s rights and gender equality over the past thirty odd years.

Syria

Syria

Our Syria work has been carried out remotely and from Turkey due to the security situation. We have identified a need to work on the capacitation and development of independent Syrian civil society and women’s organisations. Our work has focused on organisational development and capacity building through Turkey, documenting human and women’s rights violations, in addition to research, baseline and monitoring and evaluation on various topics. Due to the increasing needs, in partnership with other organisations, we are assessing the feasibility of justice and rule of law projects in the north of Syria, through Turkey.

Jordan

Jordan

In Jordan, our efforts focus on improving all aspects of women’s and girls lives, including politics, law, economy, health, social rights and education. Work in Jordan includes two lines of efforts, one that focuses on change from above, such as amending law and improving women’s and girls access to justice and protection, and change from below working on changing attitudes, behaviors and cultural misconceptions about gender. It is important to note, however, that the situation of women in Jordan is different depending on so many factors, such as class, marital status, education, ethnicity and age. In our work we use an intersectional approach addressing the differential needs of women.

We are also dedicated to improving the livelihoods and wellbeing of refugees in Jordan, particularly in relation to women refugees. We focus on addressing issues such as anti-trafficking, gender and sexual based violence, and sexual and reproductive health rights.

Lebanon

Lebanon

CTDC is partner with a number of Lebanese organisations working on the rights of sexual minorities, as well as refugees’ rights and well being. We are mainly concerned with livelihoods, trafficking, child labour, child marriage, education, and sexual exploitation of refugee women and men in the country, sexual and reproductive health rights,advocacy and media campaigning.

Tunisia

CTDC’s work in Tunisia has focused on supporting marginalised sexual groups and activists with their organisational development and capacity building. We have also run workshops focused on gender and sexual identities in order to enable a dialogue about identity that is responsive to the views of different grass-roots activists. We continue to work with Tunisian activists, offering guidance and training on advocacy work in order to enable long-term improvements in the conditions faced by marginalised communities.

Turkey

Turkey

Our work in Turkey focuses on the Syrian refugees mainly residing in the south of Turkey. CTDC has worked extensively, and closely, with Syrian refugees and Syrian organisation in the south of Turkey and in Istanbul. Our outreach in Turkey includes Istanbul, Killis, Antakya, Reyhanlı, Gaziantep, Adana and Mersin. Our work includes capacity building, awareness raising, educational programs, trainings and workshops, as well as mentoring and developing nascent organisations. Our areas of expertise in Turkey includes organisational development, children’s rights, sexual and gender based violence, gender equality, refugees livelihoods, anti-trafficking, sexual and reproductive health, and the rights and well being of sexual minorities.

CTDC is also conducting research into the protection offered to marginalised sexual groups within the Syrian and Iraqi refugee population living in Turkey, and the different challenges involved when it comes to engaging with this marginalised community.

Europe

Europe

In Europe, we focus our work on refugees, asylum seekers, ethnic and religious minorities through advocacy, media campaigning, consultancy, capacity building, educational programs, workshops and trainings, and research. We specialise in developing integration and educational programs for the refugee communities, in collaboration with universities and refugee organisations in the UK and Sweden. We realise that there is a need to address the needs of refugees and asylum seekers utilising innovative and culturally sensitive approaches, in order to ensure smooth integration processes and suitable access to rights and opportunities. Our work also involves improving access to sexual and reproductive health rights, through education and awareness raising for minority and marginalised groups, and reducing discrimination and differential treatment against refugees and asylum seekers through advocacy. In addition to that, we work on issues related to individuals belonging to different and multiple marginalised communities, such as refugees who are also sexual minorities.